


Half a Chance

by CoralFlowerBad (CoralFlower)



Category: Homestuck
Genre: (eventually) - Freeform, Blow Jobs, Bulges and Nooks, Difficult Decisions, Dual Bulges, Helmsman Sollux Captor, Mildly Dubious Consent, Multi, Power Dynamics, Rebellion, Science, Self-actualised Eridan Ampora, Sex, Tentabulges, made up troll words for things
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-06-10
Updated: 2017-07-21
Packaged: 2018-07-14 07:31:39
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,438
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7160162
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CoralFlower/pseuds/CoralFlowerBad
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“What?” He turns fully towards you, a proud smile on his face, and your bulges twist in your sheath.<br/>“There is no significant difference in lifespan betwween trolls in different positions on the hemospectrum.” Your eyebrows shoot up, and the words tumble out of your mouth before you can stop them.<br/>“What do you need me to help with, then?” The grin melts off his face, and he takes a deep breath without saying anything. You furrow your brow, and wonder what the hell it could be that’s so unconquerable he won’t even smile.<br/>“It’s not fair of me to ask you to do this, Mr. Captor."<br/>“Thollux.”<br/>“Sollux. It’s not fair for me to ask this of you, but, wwell... It’s our only choice, and death tends to be unfair.”</p><p>(Eridan is the leader of a rebellion that's largely been successful. Now, however, everything he's worked for could be lost, as the imperial government has devised a petrifying new weapon, and he needs Sollux's help to bring it down)</p><p>FUCKING SHITTY AO3 DONT COUNT THE FUCKING FORMATTING YOU ADD TO MY GODDAMN SUMMARY AS BEING INCLUDED IN THE CHARACTER COUNT. FUCK OFF OKAY I HAD THE GREATEST SUMMARY EVER AND YOU RUINED IT. IT WAS EXACTLY 1250 CHARACTERS LONG AND IT WAS EXQUISITE.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Dawn and Wonder

**Author's Note:**

> Sollux Captor is totally the type to languish dramatically and no one can convince me otherwise.

You languish dramatically in the arms of the guards carrying you (surprisingly gently) down the stark and brightly lit hallways of the rebel base; with psionic inhibitors at the bases of your horns and rope keeping you immobile, looking like you don’t give two fucks is the only superpower you have. A right, a left, a right, another left, a right, left, right, right, and so on, which your brain automatically converts into ones and zeroes and groups into eights, and you’re surprised when you end up with something pronounceable, ‘The Prince.’

If you had to guess, you’d say they’re taking you to the prince, a major player in several battles you’ve heard about, and probably many more that are classified. You’ve heard stories about him, about how he single-handedly developed more chemical weapons than your side has discovered in the past century, how he shot the heiress through the stomach and went on to take down the empress after his adult molt (all of this was centuries ago, you think, before your ridiculously paranoid guardian had finally decided to sneak you into the damn system), but most importantly, how he encouraged change and mutation and called the old system (your system) a ‘well-paved road to stagnation.’

Yeah, you’ve heard about this guy, all right, and you’re scared. You don’t know what he wants with you, but even though you’d have ended up a ship anyway, you hope it’s not for a helmsman, because you were counting on a few more sweeps of freedom before your luck ran out and you screwed up enough to be demoted that far.

There’s a door at the end of this hallway, and no passages left to turn away from it. This is it. Fuck. You feel panic coursing through your veins and shudder at the discomfort of having your psionics tucked away in the tips of your horns, because you want out you want free you want to run or scream or kick or _something_.

One of the guards presses a button by a speaker console with her elbow and you hear a wavy voice from it. It’s ridiculously low quality, and you distract yourself from fear by scoffing inwardly at the tech here. You could do so much better than this bullshit.

The door opens, and you’re carried into a sort of foyer. The doors behind you close before the ones in front open, and from the way your ears pop, you infer that this is an airlock. Weird.

And then they carry you forwards and turn you to the right and it’s him, the prince, you can tell because his sign is _right there_ , stylistically gathered into the violet robes he’s wearing. The guards let go of you, and you fall forwards, fuck you’re gonna break your nose on the floor or something, but the prince rushes forwards and catches you by the rope around your wrists just inches before your face smashes into the ground.  
“C’mon, get him a chair, guys.” The guards shuffle around a bit behind you, and the prince lifts you up enough that you can watch them get a strangely tall chair from a side closet and fit its legs into four holes in the floor, presumably so that you can’t move it by shifting your weight. Damn.  
“We were gonna do that, calm your fucking tits, your _highness_.” Your eyebrows shoot up, but the prince just snorts and replies,  
“You suck off your matesprit wwith that mouth, Serket?” The guard heaves you over her shoulder and dumps you into the chair.  
“Only if he’s good. When’s the last time you got laid, again?” The other guard pauses in securing you to the chair and checks his watch, then says,  
“Seventeen hours ago.” At this point, your mouth is hanging open, and not just because of the comfortable banter between the guards and the prince.

Now you know why there wasn’t ever a picture of The Prince included in any documents. It’s because he’s attractive enough to make any low-level officer switch sides with a single glance, and probably some of the middle ones with less than three pages, double spaced, margins of however long his bulge is (because the longer his bulge is, the less space he’d actually need to fill up with words), 10 out of 10 point Times Would Pail font. Because damn.

He’s got the smoothest horns you’ve ever seen, and lips as dark as the sky away from cities (the little places where they reflect light could be the stars). His skin is a dark grey that fades into bright violet at his fins and gills (and probably his grubscars too). He’s got claws that make you shiver, because they’re clipped and filed round, like he puts his fingers into soft places on a regular basis, and one of them is jagged like he’s bitten at it, which makes you study his teeth. They’re sharper than the boundary between day and night on Alternia’s airless moons, and perfectly straight (of course they’re straight, you tell yourself, he’s a scientist and obviously cares a hell of a lot about his appearance, no way would he tolerate anything disorderly).

He’s also tall, towering over everyone else like a tsunami, or some other word you can’t say properly. The ceiling in this room is thirteen feet tall and clear, and you hope to god it’s polarised, because the sky seems dimly lit like dawn.

The prince clears his throat to get your attention, and you take a moment to actually make eye contact with him because it makes you notice his neck again, and your psionics buzz in the tips of your horns when he looks at you. God, you’re scared and intimidated and sort of turned on right now, this fucking sucks.  
“Mr. Captor.” You make an affirmative, scared-out-of-your-thinkpan noise in the back of your throat, and vaguely notice that the guards left at some point. “Howw are you? Vvriska didn’t toss you around too much, right?” You shake your head and let out a sound of disbelief, because you’re tied to a chair in his fortress right now and he’s asking how you’re doing. “That’s good. I’m sure you’re wwonderin’ wwhy you’re here, then?” You swallow, and nod.  
“Y-yeth.” He nods too, and stands up from the throne in the middle of the room to turn his back on you and stare out of a window that, from what you can see from where you are, seems to look out onto a small city. You didn’t know they had an entire city hidden away here. That’ll be useful information if you ever get out of here.  
“I need your help,” he sighs, and turns halfway towards you again, a grim look on his face and a certain vicious hopelessness in his eyes. You chirp involuntarily and you’d swear your heart skipped a beat just then from how pitiful he looks right now. “I’vve almost achievved a perfect wworld, Mr. Captor. Our city--”  
“Thollux ith fine.” He frowns slightly, and you tense, but then his face smooths out and he continues.  
“Sollux. Our city operates wwithout mandatin’ procreation, and our mother grub still gets enough wwork to survvivve. Wwe--”  
“You have a mother grub?!” He sighs, and closes his eyes, and you slouch as much as you can in the ropes. “Thorry.” His eyes open again, and he shakes his head dismissively.  
“It’s fine. Yes, wwe havve a mother grub. Our farms are also automated, and evveryone receivves the amount of food they need. Scaled up, this system wwould sustain more trolls per planet than your government’s current average. And since nobody has to spend time producing food, they can focus on things like art, psychology, scientific developments, or discovering that the lifespan disparity between wwarm and cool bloods wwas artificially sustained under your govvern--”  
“What?” He turns fully towards you, a proud smile on his face, and your bulges twist in your sheath.  
“There is no significant difference in lifespan betwween trolls in different positions on the hemospectrum.” Your eyebrows shoot up, and the words tumble out of your mouth before you can stop them.  
“What do you need me to help with, then?” The grin melts off his face, and he takes a deep breath without saying anything. You furrow your brow, and wonder what the hell it could be that’s so unconquerable he won’t even smile.  
“It’s not fair of me to ask you to do this, Mr. Captor.”  
“Thollux.”  
“Sollux. It’s not fair for me to ask this of you, but, wwell... It’s our only choice, and death tends to be unfair.” He sounds like he’s winding up to ramble on and on, but you don’t mind, because it’ll mean you get to watch his lips. “You knoww of the monster Gl’bgolyb, correct?” Your mouth suddenly dries out, and you nod, because the idea of a lusus that could kill everyone with a single scream is the creepiest thing ever. You’re so glad that’s just a myth, damn. “Wwell. Wwe recently found out that your government is planning a raid on us that wwould use the same combination of frequencies that Gl’bgolyb’s scream wwould havve been if Fef or I evver missed a night. They figured it out by measurin’ the thing’s vvocal chords and then testin’ it to figure out exactly wwhat each note wwas. I didn’t think to destroy its body after I poisoned it, but--”  
“Wait wait wait wait are you telling me thith thing wath _real_?” He nods grimly, and you try to wrap your head around the fact that the doomsday lusus actually existed, and he killed it.  
“So they devveloped the wweapon, and.” He swallows, and you can’t help but wonder what it is he’s so scared to say, what he needs you for. “It’s mounted in a ship.” You frown for a moment, confused at the finality with which he said that, until it hits you that ships need helmsmen, and you’re a psionic.  
“You want me to offer to be at the helm, and then thabotage the mithion. But that’th not how it workth, you thtop being a perthon when they plug you in, you can’t have your own thoughtth or make dethithionth or anything,” your voice has taken on a panicky tone and you’re breathing and talking too fast, and he cuts across you, voice shaky.  
“I knoww. Wwe’vve had some success in rehabilitation and devveloped somethin’ that wwe are 99.7 percent sure wwould alloww you to keep your self through the process. But you’d be conscious for the port installations, and it’d hurt a lot, and nobody wwould blame you if you said no.” You close your eyes and make an overwhelmed sound through your nose because you don’t want to start crying; this is scary as hell to think about.  
“Why are you athking me?” He takes a while to answer, and you open your eyes to see him looking hesitant, like he doesn’t want to break you with the information he has, but fuck him, you have a right to know. You grit your teeth, and repeat, “Why the _hell_ are you athking _me_?”  
“They wwwere plannin’ to use you for it anywway.” You take a deep breath, trying to keep yourself from yelling at him, and then give up, because you’re angry right now and he can suck it.  
“Tho no matter what I choothe I’m getting turned into a fucking ship and fucking dying, probably.” He shakes his head, and you glare at him, because he’s probably lying, the bastard.  
“You can stay here. Wwe’d evvacuate, but they’vve got ships all around this system wwatchin’ us. They’d either destroy us or followw us and wwe’d be no better off.” You slump, because there’s no good way out of this, you either die, be a ship, or die AND be a ship. You can eliminate ‘die and be a ship’ probably, though. So you can either die or spend the rest of your life being a spaceship. Wheeeee.  
“You thaid thomething about rehabilitation?” He nods.  
“Wwe can’t heal the scars perfectly yet, but wwe havve a perfect record wwith recovverin’ minds. You can thank Legislacerator Pyrope for that.” You’ve heard of Legislacerator Pyrope before, you think.  
“What about my thionicth?” His face twitches slightly, like he’s dissatisfied with what he’s about to tell you.  
“Sevventy-fivve percent don’t evver get them back. Those that do report almost constant headaches. Wwe havve one case of full recovvery, and that one _is_ most recent, but I personally suspect it wwas due to an unknowwn impurity in the saline solution that threww off its electrolytic properties, and I can’t think of anythin’ that wwouldn’t destroy sensory neurons or muscle cells. And Gretel says there’s no loss of sensation or muscle function.” You have no idea what most of that meant. “Havvin’ said all that, I must implore you to go through wwith this, Mr. Captor. You are quite literally our only hope.”  
“Thollux ith fine.” You aren’t fine, actually, because he’s gorgeous and tall and earnest and you want so badly to help him, but you feel sick just thinking about what he wants you to do.  
“Sollux.” He walks around the throne and sinks to his knees in front of you, and your bulges twitch, trying to push out of your sheath. “Please.”

His eyes are bright, his skin is a smooth grey, and your face is probably flushed yellow right now, because he’s too perfect and he’s begging you.  
“I-I don’t know, I don’t know, I’m thorry,”  
“Anything. I wwill do literally anythin’ you ask of me, Mr. Captor.” You let your head tilt back and make that overwhelmed noise again.  
“Thollux.” The sky has started turning grey from its inky black, and it perfectly matches his skin right now.  
“Sollux.” You look back down at him, and the look on his face makes your bulges push out of your sheath, and you feel your cheeks heating up but you can’t tear your eyes away from his. “Anything.” God, that’s hot.  
“Th-thtop mething with me.” He leans forwards, and you moan softly in your throat.  
“I’m not messin’ wwith you, Mr. Captor.”  
“Tholluckth.” You correct him automatically.  
“Sollux. I’m not messin’ wwith you.”  
“What are you doing, then?” He glances meaningfully down at your crotch, and then makes eye contact again.  
“Anything you ask of me, Mr. Captor.”  
“Call me Tholluckth.”  
“Alright.” You take a deep breath, and look to the side to avoid his gaze. “Anythin’ else, Sollux?” You bite your lip, and look back in his direction. He’s staring almost through you.  
“Fine, alright, fine, you can-- I’ll do it.”  
“You’ll do it?” His tone is urgent, and his expression is suddenly intense. You nod, breathless.  
“I-I’ll do it, yeth. Jutht,” He nods, and reaches up to unzip your jeans.  
“You havve the gratitude of our city, Sollux. Tomorroww I’ll send someone to givve you the rest of the information you’ll need.” You nod helplessly as your bulges wrap around his wrist, and he smirks up at you in this way that really just isn’t fair at all. 

The sky is turning orange now. His face is soft, and cool, and slowly turning violet as he lets your bulges roam across it. You want to cover your face and hide, but you just clench your fists and stare up at the sky so you don’t have to watch him watching you. Something soft and moist teases at one of your tips, and you squeeze your eyes shut as the sky turns gold and you feel the filtered warmth on your skin, it’s nice, you love it.

You crack one eye open because you don’t think you’ve ever seen the daytime sky before, and it’s beautiful, it’s soft and delicate and slowly cracking as the sun pushes its way through sleepy clouds. You shiver, half from the colors and half from his mouth on your bulges and the way he breathes across them.

He slides halfway down one and squeezes gently, insistently at the other, and you whine, because it’s _good_ , and you’re going to be a spaceship.

You’re going to be a fucking spaceship. Fuck. You sob. He squeezes you almost comfortingly, and it turns into a moan as you open both eyes and look down at him, watching you. He looks pretty wrecked, one of your bulges taking up most of the space in his mouth, your yellow prematerial all over his violet-flushed face. He lets the other one in, then, and you curse softly, and his eyes slip shut, and something right by your nook flutters like a white handkerchief in the wind.

He makes a sound, and you feel it everywhere. His eyes slip shut, and you can barely keep yours open. He’s so gorgeous like this, and you don’t know how you like him better, below you and on his knees like you aren’t a pissblood and he’s not a seadweller, or grinning at you, fully-realised, confident and certain and accomplished and hot.

Probably both, you decide, as he swallows more of you and his eyelids flutter. Definitely both. When you open your mouth a moan comes out without permission, but it’s okay, because you get to watch his fins twitch in response.  
“W-what can I call you?” He opens his eyes, and slowly lifts his head like he likes you in his throat. Maybe he does.  
“Eridan.” His voice is raspy, and low, and it has that warble to it that accompanies every word of the seadweller dialect; you’re certain he wasn’t talking like that before. And that sounds like a first name.  
“Eridan?” He nods, with his eyes shut and his fins angled out to the side and trembling. “Is that, y-your first name?” He nods again, eyes back open and staring you down; not a challenge, but a promise. You squeeze your eyes shut and repeat, “Eridan,” and he makes a noise that makes you open your eyes again, and he’s ducked his head, fins fluttering, a hand pressed over his mouth like he just can't. It's beautiful, okay, it's beautiful and perfect and you can't.

"S-sorry, I'll, I'll just--" he cuts himself off, and leans back in like he's going to ignore the noise he just made, like it wasn't exquisite and perfect and made out of glass.  
"Wait, wait wait wait wait wait, jutht a thecond." He stops. So do you, you stop breathing and stop thinking, for a moment, and let the words fall out of your mouth like rain, like they're supposed to be said, supposed to slide down your skin and get your socks wet. "I-- can I fuck you?"

His fins twitch, and flush violet, and you shudder when he chitters, a do-whatever-the-hell-you-want-with-me, hell-I'd-probably-love-it sort of noise. He nods, climbs up into your lap, squirms out of his pants, looks you in the eye and presses down.

It's warm, like the sun on your skin and your laptop after nights of coding, and smooth, like his mouth. He's wet and tight and pulsing, too good and too slick and too much. God, he's making these sounds like you're tearing him apart, lost, and clinging to you like you can run away.

And he keeps pressing down, taking you in like a fucking dream, like he was made for this, like he killed the fucking Condesce and started a rebellion just to get to this point, just so he could push himself down on you and let his mouth fall open and helplessly stare into your eyes.

Except, except... there’s an edge to his noises, and you realise all at once that he’s hurting himself, doing this, he’s pushing himself too far, and no matter how good it feels, it puts an uncomfortable lump in your stomach and makes you shudder in a bad way, knowing that he’s not having fun too.  
“Sth--thtop.” You force the words out of your throat, as he forces himself down another inch and shivers, and then stops, and you have to breathe a sigh of relief, because you were almost afraid he wouldn’t, that he would just keep going anyway. “D-don’t hurt yourthelf.” You bite down hard on your lower lip to try and force back tears, but there’s no point; he can see them welling up in your eyes anyway because your shades are... somewhere else. You blink, and they spill over, and right before you squeeze your eyes shut you see him looking at you, concerned.

He lifts up, and you sigh, or sob, you can’t focus enough to figure out which because the buzzing in your horns is really distracting, you’d arch your back if you weren’t tied down. And then you feel his lips against yours, soft and warm and pulling you back down gently, and he’s wearing some kind of minty lip gloss because you can taste it on the air when you breathe him in. Your bulges dance around each other about a third of the way into his nook, and he’s making these soft, ragged sounds that just feel better in your ears than the ones he was making earlier, because they fit him better. He sounds comfortable, like he could lean against you and pull you apart with his mouth forever, and you like that. You like that a lot.

You want him to feel comfortable on you, even though you know this is likely a one time thing, and even though you know he won’t like you once you’re a spaceship. It doesn’t matter about rehabilitation, you just know.

But maybe it’s worth it, for this. You’ll have to think about it.

The buzzing in your horns has gone down with your distress, and it’s almost pleasant now, even though it only means you’re helpless beneath him. You could get into this, if you weren’t going to be a ship later. You focus on the buzz, and the warmth of his nook around part of you, and it’s honestly just really nice.

You open your eyes to lisp something out at him, and lose the words you were planning when you see his face. He’s utterly wrecked, eyes slipping halfway shut, biting down on his lower lip like he’s doing a math problem and has to concentrate, like he’s pretty sure he balanced that equation correctly but if he had there wouldn’t be some inconsistency in what he’s seeing and what he thinks he should see.

You can only gasp softly at him as he wrecks himself atop you, bearing down with the endless power of the open seas, and you’re almost worried for a moment that he’s hurting himself again, but the look on his face, so open and so softly relaxed, is enough to convince you otherwise. It’s almost peaceful, now, and it honestly feels like you could just go on like this forever. 

His breathy, barely-there moans are starting to get to you, though, and the buzzing in your horns is ramping up too. He opens one eye to peer at you through his lashes, and you shudder as he leans in close and presses his lips to yours and also presses down, down, like he can’t fight off gravity any longer, like he can’t stand holding himself away from you any more. His lips are soft against yours, and damp like tears, but he’s moving and alive and very much here, in your lap, around your bulges. You might love him.

The morning lights everything a soft yellow, and it looks like an epiphany to you, the sort of thing that makes people write poetry. He pulls back, and pushes down, and then you feel him against you (and a twisting in your stomach, because wow, he’s amazing, and wow, he’s not hurting, or not showing it if he is).  
“I-I’m close, Sollux.” You twitch your ears at him and chitter through your teeth, arms aching to break free and pull him close against you. The buzzing in your horns is so loud and you know you’re going to have one hell of a psionic headache after this, but it’s okay, because he’s looking at you like he thinks you have an answer to some question he hasn’t even asked, and figuring out what else he wants from you is more important than worrying about the future, no matter how much pain it appears to be shaping up to throw at you.  
“Yeah. Me... Me too. Shhit.” He nods, and curls in against you, head on your shoulder, nosing in against your neck, and this makes you shiver because you can feel every single nuanced change in his face in the sensitive skin there.

And then suddenly he’s still, quiet, tensed up and waiting, making you want to rub at his back and hold him close, but you can’t.  
“H-hey, relax,” you say. He shivers, and then you can hear the gasping in your ear as he lets go and lets himself rest, _finally_ , but what’s more important is the way his nook flutters around you, like some kind of fucking leaf in a storm or something, you can’t think of sappy similes right now because all of your senses except touch are shorting out, and the buzzing in your horns goes away completely as you tumble over the edge, and all you can think or feel is good, and the way his spent breaths tickle at your neck.

The sun of this planetary system is now directly overhead, and you open your eyes and stare up into it for the hell of it. It’s pretty bright, but once you stare at it long enough you can see the perfect circle hidden in the brightness, which is kind of cool. That star will keep burning bright for long after you are gone, which is comforting, knowing that the system that governs the universe doesn’t care what happens to you, that it will keep on doing its job whether you succeed or fail, that nothing in your life really matters all that much and it’s okay that it doesn’t.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> haha. over a year later, i finally post chapter two. hope you enjoy.

You leaf through the files once again right outside the guest block door; Ampora wanted you to explain the procedures to some psionic, and acted like he cared more than he usually does, so this person, whoever they are, probably won’t listen to you very well, since Ampora has repeatedly blown off your ‘how to be cool’ lessons in favor of science or something. Ridiculous.

Anyway. You rap on the door, and raise an eyebrow when you hear a psionic crackling and then the sound of the door swinging open. 

You pretend to press the talk button on your headset and say,

“Paging Dr. Ampora, we have a showoff in sector two, I repeat, a showoff in sector two heading south at zero miles per hour, I’m on the trail.”

The first thing you notice about the new guy? He smells like sex. Legit, he smells like he just got pailed for an hour straight and didn’t bother to shower.

“Pff, what?? Are you going to take this seriously or should I just accept now that I’m going to die?” 

Heh, you smell an opportunity to mess with him.

“Objection, your honor. The suspect forgets that he is going to die eventually either way.” 

You hear him sparking, and grin enourmously at him.

“Okay, ha ha, very funny, now cut the bullsthit and tell me about the chemicalth you guys are planning on pumping into my body or whatever.” 

Hmm. Maybe you should offer this nerd some ‘how to be cool’ lessons too.

“Yeah, yeah, calm your tits, I’m getting to it.”

“I don’t have tits, what the hell, I’m literally like the skinniest person ever.” 

You grin even wider.

“I’m blind.” 

You turn to the second page of your files while he stutters out some form of apology or whatever, and sniff deeply. Ahh, yes. That’s right.

“Anyway. Ampora’s the one who figured all this shit out, I’m just the one who calculated risks and figured out if it would work--”

“So you’re like a statisterroriser.”

“I’m a prosecutting attackney.” 

You take advantage of his confused silence to continue. 

“I don’t understand all the science because it’s nerd stuff, but basically how it works is you take this drug, and then undergo therapy which is supposed to develop an area of your brain specifically for routing helm signals, so the rest of your brain doesn’t get burnt out trying to play catch up. It should kind of ease you into it so there’s no huge trauma when they plug you in.” 

He smells skeptical.

“What kind of therapy can even do that?” 

Man, you are so glad he asked.

“There’s tasks like--” you flip to page seventeen-- “directing psionics through wires, modulating current flow, voltage, eventually some binary sort of stuff-- which you’ll be memorising beforehand, by the way, it has to be intuitive--” 

He snorts, and interrupts:

“I already know binary, what kind of elite haxxor do you take me for, honestly. What sort of binary stuff?”

“We’ll install a temporary port at your arm hinge, and see how you do with a stream of raw data.” 

You hear him swallow, like his throat is suddenly dry. You don’t blame him.

“I, oh. Fuck. So that’s what you mean by intuitive...”

“Yes, that’s what we mean. You can thank Serket for that one, although she may have just thought it was funny to shock people.” 

You’re pretty sure that’s what it was, since she suggested it like Hey, why don’t you just plug them into the phone jack and see if they can prank call some elite official?

“Serket’s that one guard, right?”

You heave a sigh, and cross your arms. This guy... Vriska Serket is far more than just some guard. Vriska Serket is the whole reason you’re here, working for this rebellion instead of leading your own. She’s... You’re getting off track.

“She’s not just a guard, she also pirates.” 

He snorts.

“What, like movies?” 

You roll your eyes at the pedestrian suggestion.

“No, like, ships, stealing, arrrrr! She’s known as Mindfang, you may’ve heard of her.” 

The sarcasm in your voice as you say that last part is almost tangible.The psionic chokes on air, which is hilarious.

“Holy _shit_ , that wath _Mindfang_??!”

You just nod, and he mutters a soft ‘wow’ under his breath.

“Yeah, wow, now do you understand or do I need to go over it all again?”

“How long does the therapy take?”

“About seventy two hours. After which you’ll basically be ready to be reinserted into society. We have some extra time built in, but we’d rather not need it, so it’s best for you to just cooperate and not whine about it all.”

“I don’t whine, what makes you think I whine--”

“You whined about me telling you to calm your tits.” 

He’s silent for a good five seconds, and then you just sort of sigh because you’re getting bored of standing here. 

“Are you done coming to terms with your imminent almost-demise yet?”

“Yeah, sure, whatever. Just, I’d like to talk to some of the others first.”

“Others?”

“The other psionics Eridan mentioned.”

You cock your head at his use of Ampora’s first name-- maybe it was him that this guy pailed-- but then nod, and say into your headset, for real this time,

“Hey, Newguy here--”

“My name is Sollux.”

“ _Sollux_ Newguy here--”

“Sollux Captor.”

“--wants to meet the helmspeople we’ve already helped out, is there enough time for that?”

Captor fidgets as the two of you wait for a response. And Ampora doesn’t even take that long; he must be far more nervous than he’s letting on.

“Look I knoww you’re tryin’ to be funny, but call him by his name, Pyrope. And I think they’vve got one of their group meetings happening right now, should be in uh... Block 27. He can go check that out if he wwants.”

You sigh, and motion for him to follow you out the door.

“Alright, this way.”

He perks up.

“So I can talk to them?”

You almost don’t dignify that with a response, but since Ampora seems to be going out of his way to accommodate this asshole, you nod.

“Aw, fuck yeah.”

He’s silent for the rest of the two minute walk over to block 27, and then you leave him at the door before he can ruin his streak of not saying anything. You have lawyering to do.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> how did i do with terezi's characterisation? she's a really hard character for me to write, so please comment if you have any constructive criticism. thanks for reading!


End file.
